


Hansei

by deadendworld



Category: Samurai Champloo
Genre: Everyone Has Issues, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Introspection, Rating May Change, Slow Burn, everyone's just pretending to be asleep all the time, light on fluff heavy on angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-25
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-07-17 09:50:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16093190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadendworld/pseuds/deadendworld
Summary: “When you’re traveling you can’t help but have important experiences, you know? But I think it helps if you’ve got people with you. If you’re by yourself you don’t have anything else to focus on, and you just get one perspective. But with other people, you get their side, and maybe it’s stuff you never thought of before. It’s like…you learn about yourself, from them.”Filling in the gaps, from episode 10 onward.





	1. Sanshasan'you (10-12)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sanshasan'you = "each of the three being different, each having his or her own way."
> 
> Covers Lethal Lunacy, Gamblers and Gallantry, and The Disorder Diaries.
> 
> Enjoy!

-:-

10: Mugen

-:-

Mugen’s not much for strategizing. First of all, it’s boring as hell. Second of all, it’s usually a waste of time, ‘cause even if you plan out your own strategy, you don’t know what the other guy’s gonna do. It’s way better to make it up as you go. So on the night of the full moon, he doesn’t really have a _plan_ to beat this Shoryu guy – he’s just gonna be stronger and faster than him. If he has to, he’ll try and beat the guy at his own game, use that chi thing. If he really has to – well, there’s always his ace in the hole.

But Fuu and Four Eyes act like he’s going off to die. Buncha saps.

_“You haven’t forgotten your promise, right?”_

_“Don’t forget. I will be the one who kills you.”_

Mugen doesn’t argue with either of them, for whatever reason, even though they’re both wrong. It’s probably ‘cause he’s been waiting for this fight for a whole month and he doesn’t wanna get dragged into some pointless conversation when he’s just gonna come back here later, completely fine. And then those two are gonna feel real stupid.

A small, metallic ‘clack, clack’ has him looking over his shoulder. The brat’s got a steel striker in one hand and a stone in the other, and she’s holding them up like they’re holy relics. Her face is all serious. Mugen recognizes those; she found them a couple days ago on a shrine while cleaning the temple, and asked Jin what they were for. Fishface didn’t know, and Mugen didn’t care, so she brought them to the priest. _“The practice is called kiribi,”_ Baldy had said. _“By striking the stone, you ward off evil, and call on luck. A parent might do it for a child, or a wife for a husband.”_

Fuu doing it throws him, just for a second. “Who do you think you are, my wife or something?” He says, but it comes out less mocking and more incredulous. What a weird thing to do. Especially since he’s gonna be _fine_.

He ends up using both his aces – first, the chi. He kinda knew that’s what it was gonna come down to; but if that bastard could do it, so could he. And he did. Just enough to knock the sword out of his opponent’s hands. And then, when the guy’s charging him with death in his eyes, when he’s nearly on top of him, Mugen gets him with the tanto.

Shoryu goes down, and that’s it.

Mugen staggers back against the bridge support and looks up at the sky, panting. Fuck, it feels like someone tore out all his insides. Shit hurts – but damn does it feel good too. So when he finally limps back to the temple, and he sees Fuu still outside leaning against the railing, he’s smiling through the blood. _Told ya_.

He can’t really tell from here, but he thinks she’s looking up at the moon. He sees the moment she spots him – her head turns, but she doesn’t move for a couple seconds. Then she scrambles into action and runs out to meet him, tripping over herself. She’s already yelling for Jin and the priest, but when she gets to him she won’t stop saying his name. “Mugen! Mugen, are you okay? You’re bleeding! Can you hear me? Mugen!?”

 _I’m fine, bitch, quit yelling,_ he wants to say, but if he opens his mouth he’s gonna vomit blood all over her. The last thing he remembers before he blacks out is sagging onto her, his legs finally giving out, and her panicked voice in his ear. The smell of flowers on the air.

When he wakes up, he’s alone. The sun is streaming through the open balcony door and he squints against it. He’s back in their room at the temple, laid out on a futon, fully clothed and under a blanket. It’s too warm for that shit, so he tries kicking it off, but goddamn are his muscles stiff. It takes him a couple jerking kicks. He tries to sit up, and immediately falls back down. Fuckin’ hell – if he thought he was in pain before…

He can’t get up, and he doesn’t feel like yelling for anyone, so he just lies there. It’s not too long before he hears footsteps outside, and humming – Fuu. When she rounds the corner and sees he’s awake, she breaks into a delighted smile. “Mugen! You’re up!”

She kneels at his side, setting down the tray she was carrying. “How long was I out?” He asks, voice scratchy.

“Uhh,” she taps her chin. “I guess this is the third day.”

Figures. He just about hacked up a lung after all.

“Here, drink. You need water.” She brings the jug to his lips, but he takes it from her instead. “I can do it myself.”

She plants her hands on her hips, frowning. “You can’t even sit up.”

“Oh yeah?” But the thought of trying again, putting any pressure whatsoever on his midsection, is already making his skin crawl. He sets the jug down, rolling his eyes up in exasperation. “I’ll drink it later.”

“No, you won’t. You’ll drink it now,” she bosses. Reaching for the jug again, she hesitates. “Um, here.” Mugen almost flinches when her hand slides into his hair, but she’s just trying to get her hand under his head. “Jeez, your head’s so heavy. I woulda thought it’d be all…hollow.”

“Watch it, bitch.”

She looks pleased with herself for a moment, but her expression turns serious. “Okay. Don’t freak out,” she warns.

“Huh?” He asks, but she’s already lifting his head higher, shuffling herself sideways. She works herself under him, then sets his head on her thighs. His chin’s tilted down now, enough to drink water without choking. Kinda smart. He looks up at her. “Hey…”

“Hm?”

“From this angle you can really see how flat you are.”

She flicks his cheek, hard. “Jerk! I’m trying to do something nice for you!” Huffing, she reaches for the water jug and tips it to his mouth again. He drinks – resentfully – just ‘cause she holds all the cards right now. If he pisses her off too much she’ll probably punch him in the stomach.

The silk of her kimono is cool against his skin, but underneath that he can feel warmth. He’s uncomfortable with her touching him and shit, so he averts his eyes to the open door, the balcony. That’s right where she was standing when she was nagging him about his promise. And when she did the kiribi. Aw shit, she probably thinks she had something to do with him winning. Probably thinks doing her little good luck sparks kept him alive. Which ain’t true – he won through skill. Wasn’t luck. Wasn’t her.

A cool hand brushes across his forehead, startling him. He jerks upright, sputtering, and sending razor sharp pangs through his abdomen. “What the _fuck_!” he coughs.

He falls back on her lap but she’s already scooted away, so his head hits the floor. “So-rry!” she says, looking offended. Or at least that’s how she looks upside down. “I was checking your temperature!”

“What, I got a fever now?” he demands.

“ _No_ , while you were out you’ve been all clammy. Like a corpse. I was just seeing if you were better.”

Wiping his mouth, he grumbles, “Yeah right. Trying to take advantage of me when I’m injured.”

“ _Trying to –_ ugh!” She stands and looks like she might kick his head for a second, fists clenched and trembling, before she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. “I brought you soup,” she says coldly, pointing at the tray near him. “You can eat it _yourself_.” And with that, she storms off.

Whatever. He _will_. Frowning at the ceiling, he rubs his forehead. He doesn’t need her help.

-:-

11: Fuu

-:-

“I need to buy a woman,” Jin says.

Fuu honestly hasn’t really thought about it before, but Jin never seemed to her to be a particularly sexual being. She thinks he’s handsome, of course, but it’s more of an aesthetic appreciation. Like admiring a statue. He acts more like a statue than a person sometimes anyway. She definitely hadn’t expected him to do something like visit a brothel. While Mugen was (disgustingly) vocal about his appreciation for women, Jin’s interest was mild at best. But now he shows up out of nowhere, beat up and soaking wet, and wants their money to…buy a woman.

Fuu would argue, but there’s something about the way Jin looks, the way he sounds, that makes her hold her tongue. In fact, she’s not sure what to say at all. Mugen hasn’t moved to give him the money, but he hasn’t made his usual show of stashing it somewhere in his clothes and sneering “ _get your own.”_ He hasn’t even asked for any details. Actually, he’s just standing there rubbing his jaw, barely any expression on his face – it’s almost like he’s thinking, which Fuu was certain he couldn’t do. He looks more like Jin than Jin does right now.

Finally, Mugen seems to come to a decision, and grins. “Knock yourself out.”

Jin catches the ryo as it’s tossed to him, and then he’s out the door, leaving Fuu and Mugen alone.

Mugen thinks it’s good news. Then when she protests, he thinks it’s ‘cause she wants to be Jin’s “girl.” She tries to set him straight, but he just keeps going, calling her flat as a board, calling her a _liar_ –

“Then let’s see what you got,” he taunts.

For a single second, she really does think about doing it, just to see his face – but in the next second she knows she won’t. He’s lounging on the floor, only half-interested in what she’s doing, but he _is_ looking directly at her, for once. She’s aware, for the first time, that she’s alone with him. That it might mean something for him to see her like that, even if she was just proving a point. He would be the first. She can’t. She shouldn’t.

So she turns away, mumbling, but he makes her turn back around by accusing her of being jealous! Which is ridiculous, and she tells him so – and it’s all true, she absolutely doesn’t like Jin, especially since it seems like he doesn’t like her. After all, they were alone together the whole day while they were held up at the Hakone Checkpoint and they didn’t bond _at all_. So there!

But Mugen doesn’t hear any of this, because the jerk is asleep. _Unbelievable._

Fuu is too riled up to try to do the same, so she just sits under the window and fumes. And she tries her hardest to stay angry, ‘cause otherwise she has to think about what she really feels, and she doesn’t wanna do that. So she glares at Mugen. _Jerk_. Falling asleep like she wasn’t even talking? Like he didn’t ask her a question? She should have flashed him, that woulda kept him awake. But even in her own fantasy, Fuu has to admit that she wouldn’t actually do it. She’d be afraid to. Afraid Mugen would laugh, or yawn, or something. If she was going to flash anyone, it’d be Jin, who probably doesn’t actually _like_ her, but at least he isn’t mean to her like Mugen is.

But it really doesn’t matter whether it’s Jin or Mugen. They might say it different ways, but they’d be saying the same thing: nice try, little girl.

Maybe that’s why these guys keep trying to leave her. Sure, she’s cute, but she isn’t…sexy. Fuu brings her legs tight to her chest, hiding her face in her knees even though no one can see it. Flat as a board, that’s what Mugen had said. That’s why Jin wanted to buy a woman tonight.

It’s worse, somehow, the next night. When she stops Jin outside their room. Because when she hears him say it’s not pity, she knows she was wrong, but the truth isn’t any better. He’s not just leaving for the night because he has needs – he’s leaving _forever_ because he’s fallen in love. He’s breaking his promise to her. _Aren’t samurai supposed to be honorable?_ She wants to shout at him as he walks into the night.

And she must be the biggest sucker in Japan, because she _still_ drags Mugen out to help him later, and she watches him run off into the darkness with Kohana, and all she can think is she just wants him to be happy. Even if he breaks his promise, even if he leaves her.

…

“Can’t believe that bastard left us to clean up his mess,” Mugen huffs, but Fuu just shushes him. They hustle quickly through the underbrush, Mugen grumbling the whole time. She knows he would’ve preferred to stay and fight ‘til the last man, but she just wants to leave; day is breaking, and she doesn’t wanna be here if they call for reinforcements. And…she just wants to leave this town, and everyone in it, far behind.

A rustle behind them – Fuu just about leaps out of her skin, stifling a shriek, then actually shrieking as Mugen draws his sword and shoves her out of the way. She falls to the ground, and a figure emerges from the foliage, and –

“Bout time, ya coward,” Mugen scoffs. “You missed all the action.”

Fuu, still on her ass, can’t see past Mugen. But she doesn’t need to. Setting her jaw, she turns away as she gets to her feet, dusting herself off. “Come on. They’ll probably send more guards after us.” Without looking back, she takes off.

Who is she angry at? She has no idea, she just is. Why does she have to fight so hard to get these guys to stay with her? All Kohana had to do was _exist_ and she got Jin to run away with her. _But why is he here now? What happened to Kohana?_ And under her anger and confusion, there’s a deep well of relief that Jin didn’t really leave her. Which makes her more angry, and more confused.

It’s not until much later, when they’re confident they haven’t been followed and have found the road again, that Fuu lets herself look at him. They’re walking side by side, Mugen just ahead of them. Jin’s the same as ever, stoic and composed. He doesn’t look like he’s fallen in love, or that he’s left the woman he loves behind. She can only guess what he’s feeling.

He must feel her eyes on him, because he looks at her and raises a delicate eyebrow, prompting her to talk. Fuu hesitates – she’s not exactly sure what to say. “Is Kohana okay?”

Jin studies her face, then nods. “Good,” she says softly. They walk in silence for a while.

“Her name is Shino.”

Fuu looks up at Jin questioningly. He’s not looking at her, though – his eyes are on the road ahead of them. “I sent her across the river to a divorce temple.”

All Fuu can think is: isn’t it strange that the only true samurai left in this country is a ronin who killed his master? It’s easy to forget, because she so often sees the less glamorous parts of his life, when he’s starving or irritated, drunk, exhausted, distant, resigned – but at his core, Jin is so noble. He saved Shino from the brothel and her awful husband all at once, and he’s still staying with Fuu. He managed to do the right thing for everyone but himself.

She feels something warm rush up from the pit of her stomach, some great affection that nearly chokes her with its intensity. “Jin…” she says urgently, wanting to look at him, wanting him to meet her eyes. “I’m sorry.” His face is passive, curious. “For what I said. It was horrible and…I didn’t know what I was talking about. So. Sorry.”

“Aa. It’s alright.” She’s not sure she’s ever heard his voice so gentle.

Is that what it is to be in love? Does it make you kinder, even when you’re sad?

She leaves the conversation there; she should let him be alone with his thoughts. But the rest of the day, all she can think about is Jin and Shino – and more broadly, love. Not the love she already knows, the love she has for her mother – a deep ache and an overwhelming fondness all at once – and not the love she has for Momo, her oldest friend, which is lighter and sweeter. She thinks about the love two people can have for each other.

Funny…she’s read about it in stories, but it never seemed all that real to her ‘til now. She didn’t think people acted like that in real life, she’s certainly never seen it. But what is Jin, if not straight out of a story? _What’s it like to love someone?_ Fuu wonders, scuffing her feet along the road, kicking up little dust clouds. _What’s it like to be loved?_ She thinks as they rest in the shade of a giant pine tree, the wind playing with her hair.

And – for the first time, Fuu wonders what it’s like to _make_ love. Not to have sex, because she’s heard more than enough about that. But to make love, to share your body with someone who cares for you, someone who wants to be with you. She can’t be sure, but she thinks Jin must have made love to Shino, when he took the money to buy her. That’s how it happens in the stories: the hero and the heroine, consumed with love, consummate their union.

 _What’s it like to make love to someone who loves you?_ She wonders as she looks up at the sky, watching sunset streak the clouds red and purple, like a wound.

She watches Jin while they’re walking, and while they’re resting, and when they settle down for the night in a small clearing. She’s not sure what she’s watching for. He does the same things he always does. He methodically unpacks his things and lays out his bedroll, waiting patiently for the fish Mugen caught earlier to cook on the fire. Fuu even watches him while she’s chowing down, which is normally a task that consumes all her attention. He’s so funny – he eats delicately even though she knows he’s just as hungry as they are. Any other day she’d call him stuck up, but she’s feeling charitable today. Now he’s just amusing, and interesting.

It occurs to her that she hasn’t been thinking of her yojimbo as real people – they’re both so ridiculous, who can blame her? But they are. They don’t act like it, but they have depth to them. Especially Jin. He gets on her nerves sometimes, and she still doesn’t totally understand him, but he’s a good person. A good man.

 _What’s it like to make love to a man like that?_ Fuu wonders, gazing up at the sky, the moon so big and bright she thinks she could almost touch it if she was just a little closer.

-:-

12: Jin

-:-

This world is not black and white.

Jin’s ronin status does not erase the years of mental and physical discipline that he underwent at the Mujushin dojo. Bushido tomes might as well be engraved in his skull for how often he read and recited them, and sometimes he feels he has spent three years of his life on kata alone. But life is more than tomes and kata. He realized that when he left the dojo. How frustrating it was to learn that his sensei’s lessons could not provide an answer for everything. How painful.

There are gray areas in the world, and these are the ones Jin has difficulty navigating. For instance: he respects Fuu’s right to privacy and personal property. But in the interest of learning why he’s being dragged across the country to Nagasaki, he’s willing to invade that privacy by temporarily borrowing her personal property.

In other words, he’s reading her diary aloud.

If anyone is to blame, it’s Mugen. Jin has had his doubts about where they’re going and who they’re looking for, but was willing to suspend them. But Mugen stirred those doubts, even suggesting that Fuu might be keeping something important from them. Still, Jin would not have acted on his own – it’s the vagrant who sneaks down to the hot spring and returns with the little book. And yet Jin plays his part; he mildly protests the underhandedness, but doesn’t outright disagree, and thereby gives his tacit approval. And he reads the diary himself, when it’s clear Mugen can’t.

Fuu writes much the way she talks – a little full of herself. He’s surprised to hear her thoughts on some of the things and people they’ve encountered; or rather, surprised to hear her lack of thoughts. Mostly, as Mugen points out, it’s about food. She does have things to say about _them_ : ‘crazy guys’, ‘bozos’, ‘jerks’, she calls them. Nothing surprising there, she says as much to their faces.

But…it’s strange, to read what she’s written about him. _Attractive_. He doesn’t know what to make of that. _Two of a kind_ – he knows how to feel about that. He and Mugen voice their mutual displeasure, protests overlapping, and Jin bats away the vague notion of irony.

Finally, there is some mention of what they’ve been looking for, the sunflower samurai – but it is worse than Jin expected. Fuu has _no idea what she’s doing_. She took them to Edo on a rumor, and she’s taking them to Nagasaki on little more than a Dutchman’s best guess. That can’t be it. There must be something else. Even if she doesn’t know where he is, she must have written something else about him. A description. A name. A reason. So Jin reads on.

But the next entry makes him regret his decision. His voice trails off as he reads the page silently. Mugen prods him, irritated, and Jin should stop there, put the diary back – but he continues. For the first time, he feels that he is intruding on something personal. Fuu is writing about her mother. Her previously concrete descriptions turn vague. She says nothing about what she feels, only that she does. She is similarly vague about someone named Shinsuke, and his mother – it takes Jin a moment to realize that this is the thief who took Fuu hostage. Jin had never learned his name. What a strange sensation, to know that this brief mention in a stolen diary is all he will ever know of her feelings on this boy and his mother. Neither he nor Mugen ever asked her about what happened. And now the time to talk about it has passed.

It’s almost a relief when she moves on to write about something else; Fuu expresses exasperation with her yojimbo much more readily than any other emotion. So she has plenty to write about Hakone Checkpoint. She declares a total lack of trust in Mugen – which Mugen loudly protests, although Jin personally feels it is warranted. And as for Jin – _“Does he hate me or something?”_ her delicate handwriting wonders. “ _How long is it gonna take before he finally gets around to opening up to me?”_

“Hey,” Mugen elbows him. “Man to man, what do you really think of her, anyway?”

What does Jin think of Fuu? What Jin thinks is that despite Mugen claiming curiosity about the sunflower samurai, he seems much more interested in her commentary on certain other people. Every time Fuu has mentioned him, he’s perked up, only to shout at the diary when she inevitably degrades him. But what does he, Jin, think of Fuu? Truthfully he does not think of her very often, not in any contemplative way. She’s so…immediate. One of very few constants in his life. On the occasions that they’ve parted ways he hasn’t even had time to register her absence, because through fate or her own willpower she unfailingly returns to him. Jin has never had to decide what he thinks of her, or whether or not he even likes her. So, a lesson from his sensei: if one is not sure what to say, then it’s wise not to speak. “Hmm,” Jin murmurs, and Mugen mutters that he’s ‘hopeless.’

Fuu writes up until they met Father Zuikou. She says nothing of their time in Hamamatsu, nothing of Shino. Instead, she wraps up with a thoughtfulness that’s been mostly absent so far. It’s almost philosophical, the way she talks about their journey. Mugen is saying something, wants his opinion again, but Jin’s thinking about what she wrote, about wanting to travel together to the end. Being sure that’s what they wanted too. Jin hadn’t truly considered whether he _wanted_ to accompany Fuu to Nagasaki – he’s gone this far out of obligation and by chance. He had assumed it was the same for his two companions. But for all her complaining, Fuu says she is happy to be traveling with them. “Hmm,” he says again.

Jin flips the last page, and – it’s a trick. He can feel his face start to twitch as he reads it, and Mugen stiffens beside him. “You…you little bitch!” he shouts at the diary, and although Jin can’t agree with the sentiment entirely, he’s also feeling a little…played.

Fuu comes back from the hot spring happy and smiling. She knows, then. Mugen ignores her outright, rolling to position his back to the door when she comes in. Jin finds himself not wanting to speak to her either. On the one hand, she tricked them; on the other, he read through her – supposedly – personal thoughts, uninvited. And she knew, or suspected, that he would do it. It’s…vexing. Jin doesn’t like the idea of being predictable, especially predictable in such a dishonorable way.

“So hey,” Fuu begins, dropping down onto the floor. “Have either of you guys seen – “

Wordlessly, Jin hands her the diary. Fuu receives it with conspicuous gratefulness. “Oh, thanks! I must’ve dropped it up here. ‘Cause I was sure I put it in my basket, but when I was getting dressed I couldn’t find it. I guess it was here the whole time! I’m glad it – “

“Fuu,” Jin murmurs tiredly.

“Sorry, just teasing! Man, you guys are way too serious.” She begins to hum to herself, and that’s the only sound in the room for a few minutes. Strangely, even though he knows she’s in a good mood at his expense, Jin doesn’t mind the sound. He crosses his arms and leans back against the wall, closing his eyes. Fuu’s voice is much nicer when she isn’t yelling or whining.

Mugen disagrees. “Cut that shit out,” he snaps over his shoulder.

Leaning into Jin’s space, Fuu whispers peevishly, “What’s his problem?”

“I believe he feels tricked,” Jin murmurs in answer. Fuu remains where she is, and the air is filled with the faint scent of flowers. Odd. Jin didn’t know she owned perfume. Where did she get the money for such a luxury?

“My _problem_ ,” Mugen rolls back over, “is that you’re a sneaky little bitch.”

“I am not! You’re the ones who stole my diary and read my private thoughts and feelings.”

“Are you kidding? That thing was nothing but lies!”

Fuu smiles smugly. “Not all of it.”

Mugen puffs up, but before he can start a real argument with Fuu, she rises and heads for the door. “Where are you going?” the vagrant asks suspiciously.

Fuu throws a smile back at him from the doorway. “I’m gonna go write in my diary.” And she’s gone.

Mugen mutters something unkind, then falls silent. It’s unlikely, but maybe he is parsing through the same quandary Jin is. If not all of the diary was falsified, as she said, then what was true? And how to ask her about it? Interrogating her outright, back when they first started on this journey, had yielded nothing. And clearly espionage is not an option. For such a direct girl, Jin notes that Fuu is remarkably skilled at evasion, feinting around their questions, distracting them with little tricks like the false diary. He had not really felt _lied_ to, even though that’s what she was doing.

What does he think of Fuu? He thinks she makes the question very difficult to answer.

Out of nowhere, a memory interrupts his musings. Another lesson from his sensei _._ One of the first he can remember; he had been young then. Another student at the dojo had picked a fight with him, over what Jin can’t recall. His attitude, most likely, or his skill. But the other boy had been older, taller, and he had attacked Jin with fists instead of a sword. Jin had fought back as best he could, and was able to deal substantial damage, but he was simply not good enough yet to account for their difference in size and strength. They both walked away injured, there was no real winner. But Jin had been certain of this: because he had not won, he had lost.

_“Where did you get these bruises?” Shishou asks the next day._

_Fighting the boy was wrong. He knows that. He also knows that a half-truth is the best lie. “A spar.”_

_His sensei instructs him to sit seiza, and sits opposite. “Lying is a serious matter, Jin,” the man says gravely._

Jin had said nothing, but even now he remembers the deep shame of the moment.

_“However, I cannot tell you that you must never lie.” Shishou continues. “It is both good and necessary to practice honesty, but you may find that there are times when telling the truth is harmful, and you will want to lie. You must then ask yourself – if I lie, do I protect my own selfish interests? Or do I protect others?”_

_Jin takes a moment to parse through the philosophy for the relevance to his life. “So…if I am protecting others, it’s not wrong to lie?”_

_“That is for you to determine. You must have the wisdom to know which action will bring the least harm. But know this: if you lie without that wisdom, even in the service of others, you will not be doing the right thing.”_

…

It’s a long time before Fuu returns. She creeps in quietly, but her soft footfalls still rouse Jin from the almost-sleep he had fallen into against the wall. The fire has died down, but there’s just enough light to see the outline of her form. Unwilling to disrupt the charade, Jin peers at her from under his eyelashes, tracking her slow progress across the room.

Mugen is asleep, or at least pretending to be. Jin thinks he’s too perfectly still to really be convincing, but Fuu believes it because she creeps past him with the utmost care. It’s a far cry from her earlier confident saunter. She’s even foregone her sandals; they’re dangling by the straps from her fingers. They aren’t noisy, not like Mugen’s geta, but she must have thought they might accidentally scuff the floor as they often do when the three of them are walking. They’re ridiculous shoes, he’s never been sure why she wears them. Indeed, she’s more graceful barefoot. Without their extra height, though, her feet are pale and small, almost childish.

When she gets to her bedroll, she settles very slowly, then curls up into herself. Is she relieved? Satisfied? How childish, to avoid their questions and come slinking back later hoping they’re asleep. How cowardly. Does she think she’s successfully evaded them? Jin has the brief, absurd urge to throw something at her. Or let his daisho clatter to the floor. Do something to disrupt the quiet. _Why are you lying?_ he wants to ask. _Who are you lying for?_

But is he not also lying? He hasn’t told them yet what happened at the dojo, not everything. And he isn’t planning to. He’s told them enough, what they need to know and nothing more. His silence doesn’t come from shame, or a desire to deceive. He thinks of Fuu’s few words on her mother, one part of the diary he can be sure wasn’t fabricated, because he recognized his own reticence there. Sometimes a loss is too painful to recall. No – it’s not shame that keeps him from speaking of his sensei. And he has not _lied_. Not that it should matter to his companions, but there has only been truth in what little he has told them. If it is a lie, it’s only one of omission. A gray area.

But that means Fuu has not really lied either. He’s certain she hasn’t told them the whole truth, but as far as he knows she’s never given them false information. He suspects that the only false parts of her diary are the ones that went unsaid. For what purpose?

 _Who are you lying for?_ He wonders again. But he won’t disturb the quiet to ask. Only the faint sounds of crickets and rustling leaves come through the window. Fuu has tucked herself into her bedroll, and Mugen is sprawled on his back, and Jin is leaning against the wall, each pretending to sleep. Each of them lying, for their own reasons.


	2. Giakushumi (13-14)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Giakushumi = "the propensity to paint oneself in as bad a light as possible; acting like the bad guy."
> 
> Covers Misguided Miscreants (Part 1 & 2).

-:-

13 & 14: Mugen

-:-

Kohza asks him if he’s happy. It’s a stupid thing to ask, she should know better. She grew up on that island too.

“I ain’t never given it much thought,” he answers, and he hasn’t.

Mugen tries to just listen to the crashing waves, but Kohza’s presence is distracting. What’d she come out here for, anyway? She’s been pulling this shit all day, acting like they’re old friends. Always trying to make a bigger deal out of something than it is. Out of the two of ‘em, Mukuro’s the only one who knows how things really are, which is about the only thing he was ever good at. That, and being a dick.

“Fuu is really lucky,” Kohza says softly.

Lucky? He wouldn’t say that. That broad gets swindled every morning and kidnapped every night. “You think so?” he says anyway.

“Yeah…because she gets to be with you, Mugen.”

Ugh. Fucking Kohza, and her weird fucking statements. Nobody’s ever been lucky to be with him, ‘cause nobody’s ever _been_ with him. It’s like he told Mukuro: he doesn’t work for anyone but himself. This thing with Fuu and Four Eyes is temporary, as far as he can tell it’s just luck and convenience that they’ve stayed together this long. And Fuu bitching about her sunflower samurai every chance she gets. She definitely doesn’t _act_ like she’s lucky.

“Mugen…” Kohza lays a hand on his stomach, like she’s testing the waters, making sure he won’t spook and run away. She lays her head down on him, folding into herself like a child. “I want to be with you, too. Just like she is. I want to run away from here.”  She’s got one hand resting over his heart, and the other curled over the sharp curve of his hipbone. He’s not looking at her, but he can feel when she turns her face turn towards him. “So let’s run away. Together,” she pleads, nearly a whisper.

Girl’s got it all wrong. That’s not how it is with Fuu, he’s not with that brat, not the way Kohza’s thinking. But he knows why she thinks that way. She’s from the island. She wouldn’t understand why a man would stay with a woman if she wasn’t giving him her body in return. Mugen’s wondered the same thing – what’s he doing? He’s not getting anything out of this deal. But it just…ain’t like that.

That’s what Kohza’s offering, though, touching him the way she is. Fuu’s never touched him like this – as dumb as she is, she’s smart enough not to do something like that, even accidentally. But Kohza knows what it means.

There was this dog back on the island, back when they were kids. It was somebody’s pet once, so it didn’t know how to fend for itself; went around the beaches and the piss-poor excuse for a town begging for scraps, and it just got skinnier and skinnier ‘cause nobody on that goddamn island was gonna give their food to a dog. Hell, that mutt was more likely to get eaten that to get to eat. Kids with nothing better to do used to throw rocks and see if they could hit it, and it was too stupid to stay away. It just kept coming back for more.

“Sorry, lady. I ain’t that kinda guy.” Mugen gets up, Kohza sliding off him like water. He picks up his sword and he can see her out of the corner of his eye, just a blur of tan skin and shaggy dark hair, like his. Two big dark eyes. “See ya,” he says with an offhandedness that’s not all the way natural. But whatever. He was gonna have to leave soon anyway, it’s almost time. And then he’ll be done with this, and done with them, forever.

…

Dying fucking sucks.

Or, more like, coming _back_ from dying sucks. ‘Cause when he was dying he didn’t feel it, he didn’t feel anything, but when we wakes up his body’s all weak and shit, and his limbs are too long, or too short maybe, and his skin is too tight and he’s in pain, yeah, but the pain is nothing compared to how _wrong_ it all feels. Like he’s not in the right body. So at first, he’s not even sure he did come back.

But he can’t be dead, ‘cause all of a sudden he can hear her voice. She’s talking to herself – he catches Jin’s name, Kohza’s, and then “…Mugen…” Then there’s a soft sound as her kimono rustles over the tatami, but he catches her by the wrist before she can get very far away. And he can’t be dead, because she’s warm and soft in his grip, her fine bones turned against his palm.

His tries to speak – his throat works up a couple rasps, but that’s it. Luckily, the girl does what he wants for once, and practically falls down over him to get closer. “What?” she asks quietly, urgently.

“I’m starving,” he manages.

He can feel more than hear her irritation – the lightest brush of air against his chin as she exhales. But it’s gone in a second, and her voice is warm. “Hang on, I’ll go scrounge something up,” she says assuredly, then hurries off.

And then he’s alone. He feels weak just from moving his arm and talking, which isn’t a good sign. He’s got somewhere to be and he needs to be able to do complicated shit, like walk and swing a sword. He didn’t see her face. He’s too weak to even open his eyes – so he didn’t see her face. Fuck, he must have broken a rib or something because inside his chest feels… _bad_. Man up, he tells himself. Man the fuck up.

It takes him a minute, but he finally manages to crack his eyes open. Alright. That’s step one.

…

By the time he gets back to the village it’s nighttime, and those government fucks have cleared out, so the only light besides the moon is coming from the little shack they’ve taken for themselves. As he passes one dark and empty house after another, his eyes on their hut in the distance, he can’t decide if the faint glow from the windows looks cozy or morbid.

“Mugen!” Fuu says when he comes in, and Jin comments, “You’re back.”

“Yo,” Mugen greets, staggering towards the tatami and flopping onto his bedroll with a grunt.

Fuu’s immediately fussing over him. “Honestly Mugen,” she chides as he struggles out of his haori, “I turn my back for five seconds and you disappear all day. You could at least leave me a note or something.” He couldn’t, ‘cause he has no idea how to write, but she doesn’t need to know that. “And after I spent all night looking for you! Mou, I can’t even blink without you guys running off.”

“Got any food?” is what Mugen grunts. Fuck. He’s in pain all over and his movements are weird and jolting, like he doesn’t have total control of his limbs. He finally tears off his haori, probably making the gaping holes worse, but it’s not unfixable. Fuu always manages to sew everything up.

“We _had_ food,” Fuu rolls her eyes, “but we didn’t know if you were dead or alive, so I didn’t save any for you.”

“You wouldn’t, ya pig.”

He gets a kick for that – much lighter than usual, but unlike usual it actually hurts. “Ow, bitch.”

“I wouldn’t be calling _me_ a pig if I were you! Do you know how heavy you are? And guess who had to drag your sorry butt all the way up here from the beach?”

Did she really? It’s not a short distance. The scrawny brat must have had some help. Even if she did, it’s a good couple hundred shaku to carry dead weight. He wonders how long it took, and how many of his scrapes and bruises are actually from her clumsy ass instead of the explosion. Oblivious to his thoughts, Fuu’s expression softens, and her voice follows. “Well, whatever. I’m just glad you’re okay.” She considers something. “Did you…do what you needed to?”

He glances over at Jin, who meets his gaze and nods. So he caught Fuu up to speed. _But did he tell her he killed Mukuro?_ If he did he wouldn’ta said it like that. ‘ _I took care of him’_ or ‘ _I avenged Mugen’_ or something like that. ‘Cause that’s the way Jin would see it, his dumb samurai code wouldn’t let him let Mukuro go unpunished for _‘taking the life he was supposed to take’_ or whatever. Honestly Mugen doesn’t get that whole samurai mentality – they’re supposedly strong and honorable, but that must’ve been a long time ago because these days they’re all boring losers. They talk a big game but you can tell they’ve never been in a real fight; all they knew how to do is hang around brothels and go on and on about how prestigious and noble their clan was a hundred years ago when it actually mattered. Nowadays they gotta hire themselves out as thugs just to make ends meet. Not that any of ‘em are worth the blade they carry. As far as Mugen can tell samurai are just puffed-up clowns with two swords too full of themselves to realize they don’t matter anymore.

And Jin is the worst, because he won’t admit to it. Still pretends he’s got an honor code, when really he’s just a selfish ronin prick who does what he wants and acts like he’s better than everybody ‘cause he trained in some pussy dojo. The bastard killed his master and plenty of his fellow dojo bitches and he still acts like he’s Yoshitsune. Looks at Mugen like he’s trash. _Couldn’t kill me though, could ya? Had to kill Mukuro to make it even. Fucker._

“Did you kill her?” Fuu asks quietly, drawing his attention back to her. Ah, he never answered her question. She’s still talking about Kohza. She’s surprised him there, usually she doesn’t like talking about killing and shit. She’s looking right at him, too. Her eyes are big, but there’s not a lot else on her face – no judgment one way or another, no hope, no fear.

Mugen rubs his jaw. “No,” is all he says.

No, he hadn’t gotten to kill Mukuro – damn Four Eyes stole that from him – but Kohza was fair game. He could have killed her, easy, and she woulda deserved it. Just as much of a snake as Mukuro, in the end, but she was worse because she hid behind her sob story about wanting a better life off the island.

_“I want to escape this place. I want out of this hell.”_

No. She’d gotten what was coming to her.

Fuu asks Jin something, and Mugen kind of tunes out. He’s thinking about that dog again. He doesn’t remember what he was doing that day, but he came back down to the beach one afternoon and he could hear the dog before he even cleared the edge of the forest, screaming. What he does remember is thinking that it was the worst sound he’d heard in his life.

One of those kids had finally nailed it in the head, but it wasn’t dead, not yet. It was just lying there on the beach bleeding and crying, knowing nothing but pain, waiting to die. He wasn’t sure how long it’d been there, but the kids were long gone. For all he knew, Kohza mighta been one of ‘em. She was always trying to fit herself in somewhere. Not throwing rocks, not her, but sitting on the sidelines, watching.

He’d been sleeping on that beach. He told himself he didn’t feel like moving somewhere else and he didn’t wanna wait around for the dog to die, so he made up his mind. He took his sword – a smaller one back then, he wasn’t strong enough to carry a full-sized blade – and he walked down to the rocks where the dog was lying on its side. He meant to kill it right away, to shut it up. But he looked down at it, and he looked into its wide-open eye, and he couldn’t. So he sat down next to it. He listened to it cry for a long time.

A little yawn from Fuu brings him out of his memory. “This village gives me the creeps,” she says, rubbing her arms. “Can we leave tomorrow?”

“I don’t see why not, as long as we have a boat,” Jin says. “I also have no wish to stay here any longer than necessary.”

“How do you feel?” Fuu asks Mugen. “Do you think you can travel across to Ise?”

He grunts noncommittally.

“Because you’re the one who’s gonna have to sail the boat. Jin and I don’t know what we’re doing.”

Jin’s eyebrow twitches slightly, barely noticeable, but Mugen’s gotten good at reading him. He always gets a kick out of Four Eyes’ obvious inadequacy. Plus – _“he knows how to work a boat?” Fuu asks, and even as far away as he is he can hear the wonder in her voice_. He almost wants to say he can, but the weakness in his limbs says different. “Then, no,” Mugen groans, stretching his arms out over his head. “Can’t sail yet.”

“Mou,” Fuu laments, dropped her chin into her hands. “I wish there was a ferry. Not that we’d have the money for it. Hey!” she exclaims, perking up. “What about the money from the shogun’s ship?”

“What about it.”

“Well – do you know where it is? If we had that we’d be set for – well, for life! I mean…you earned it.”

“Nah.”

“Yes you did! You nearly got blown up trying to – “

“ _No_ , I don’t know where it is.”

That deflates her. “Oh. Does…Kohza know?”

“Doubt it.”

“You don’t think her brother told her?” Fuu suggests, but even as she’s saying it she doesn’t sound hopeful.

“He wouldn’t.”

“Mukuro must have told his accomplice, the shogun’s man,” Jin comments.

“Well if he did he ain’t gonna be telling anyone anytime soon,” Mugen says grimly.

Fuu makes a questioning little noise, but Jin just nods. “I suspected as much,” the ronin murmurs. Mugen eyes him, ready to fight, but Jin isn’t giving him that ‘you’re lawless garbage and I loathe you’ look. He’s got his arms crossed, gazing at Mugen placidly. ‘ _Good,’_ his dark eyes say. Looks like they’re on the same page.

Either Fuu figures out what they mean, or she decides it’s not worth it to ask, and that seems to be the end of the conversation. Mugen closes his eyes. After a few moments, the other two start getting ready for bed. Straightening their bedrolls, saying goodnight to the little vermin in their kimono, strategically placing their daisho, and so on. He cracks one eye open. He noticed earlier – Fuu set her bedroll much closer to him than usual. Clingy bitch. Jin settles down after a bit, but she’s taking her sweet time smoothing out her blankets, arranging her things. Once she’s done with that, she hesitates, then reaches up towards her hair.

Sometimes she leaves it up in its stupid little bun even to sleep, but maybe she’s finally tired of getting stabbed in the skull by her hairpins. Mugen watches idly as she works the tie out of her hair, letting it fall, then removes her hairpins and sets them aside. They look pointy and uncomfortable even from here – they’d make good weapons if Mugen didn’t know for a fact he could snap one with just his thumb and pointer finger. They’re cheap little things, but Fuu treats them like they’re precious. If she loses one of ‘em, even for a few minutes, she gets all antsy looking for it.

Once her hair’s free, she tilts her head and begins combing her fingers through it, working out tangles or knots that Mugen sure can’t see. He only saw her do this one other time, the first time they had a room with a mirror in it. Fuu was so enamored with it, she spent half the night making faces, checking herself from all angles, examining her own features like she was looking at a horse for sale. She even tried out different hairstyles, each one stupider-looking than the last, until she gave up and shook it all out. But by then her hair was a mess, so she painstakingly worked her fingers through it to get it back to normal. _“I was just trying something different,”_ she huffed, unprompted.

Fuu isn’t looking at anything in particular, just staring off into space as she runs her fingers through her hair, over and over. Shit’s so straight and shiny it can’t be that tangled. What’s she doing it for? She looks over at him and notices he’s watching her, and she drops her hands a little self-consciously. “Hey,” she says softly.

She seems like she’s got something to say. Mugen opens his other eye, waiting.

She adjusts herself to sit seiza, facing him. “I’m glad you didn’t die,” she says, pitches her voice quiet, like she doesn’t wanna wake up Jin.

“Me too,” Mugen murmurs, cocking an eyebrow, and she laughs a little.

“It was kind of funny – I mean, it wasn’t, but – “ she shakes her head, smiling at herself. “I just kept thinking, ‘he’s not dead, he isn’t dead’ while I was looking for you, but then when I finally found you, you looked just like a corpse. And I saw the explosion, and I knew you’d been in the water all night, so I didn’t even check to see if you were breathing. I just thought, ‘he really is dead.’ Even though I spent the whole night looking for you, convinced you were alive. Isn’t that funny?”

“You and me got real different senses of humor.”

“Aw, I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant…” She picks at a loose thread on her kimono. “…I don’t know what I meant.”

Mugen spares a glance at Four Eyes, who hasn’t moved once but definitely isn’t sleeping. He’s the same as Mugen, awake at even the slightest noise, so he’s probably listening to everything they’re saying. In that case, no need to worry about waking him up. Mugen’s not tired yet. “How’d you find me, anyway?” he asks, rolling over onto his side. He props his head up on his hand, and some new ache flares up in his side.

“Well, like I told you – I spent all night searching the beach.” She might’ve mentioned that, he mentally concedes. “I thought I’d never find you. It was a total coincidence, I was running by and I heard someone yelling so I went to check it out, and this fisherman was just scared out of his mind pointing at his net. And I looked, and it was you.” She bites her lip, then smiles to throw off the sudden seriousness. “Hehe…the poor guy probably thought he caught a kappa.”

“Whazzat?”

Fuu looks surprised. “A kappa? You know, a water imp? Mischievous? Looks like a turtle?” Realizing the problem, she squints at him. “That’s pretty basic Japanese lore. How long have you lived here?”

“Damn, I learned your language, what more do you want?” he complains. Fuckin’ Japanese think they own the world. And they – “Oi, wait a minute, you sayin’ I look like a turtle?”

Fuu smiles patiently. “That was the joke, yeah.”

Mugen ponders this with narrowed eyes, and then a grin spreads across his face. “Know what we call turtles where I’m from? _Kami_.”

“No way. You made that up.”

“It’s true. I guess no matter how you slice it, I end up a god,” he preens.

“Well then, kami-sama, what do you calls gods?”

Oh? He’s never met a Japanese person that gave a shit about any of the Ryukyuan languages. But she’s looking at him expectantly, like a kid waiting for a bedtime story. Ha – any story he told her about the islands would give her nightmares for a week. He debates telling her to shove off and let him sleep, but…maybe he owes her for dragging him up from the beach. What the hell, why not. “Not so different. We call ‘em _kam_. _Jamanukam_ is god of the mountains. _Mijjinukam_ ’s the water god. Or,” he adds, just now remembering, “if they’re evil, like the god of plague, they’re called _ma_.”

“ _Ma_ ,” Fuu repeats thoughtfully. Her brow furrows in concentration. “Mijeenokamu.”

“Nah, _Mijji nukam. _No ‘oo’ on the end.”

“Mi-jee-nu-kam,” she sounds out slowly. “Was that better?”

“Not really.”

She leans out on her hands and knees to swat at him playfully, but the only thing she can reach easily is the arm holding up his head. There’s no intent behind it, so her fingers just kinda brush across his forearm. They leave little prickling trails across his skin; it almost feels like when a limb falls asleep and you gotta shake it awake, but this isn’t painful. Weird sensation. But not bad. Lot better than being kicked, anyway. Fuu rocks back, and they lapse into silence.

She begins fiddling with the ends of her hair, twirling soft-looking locks around her fingers. Mugen just watches her. Japanese women all wear their hair up all the time, least as far as Mugen’s seen; whores keep it pinned up even for sex. Even Fuu wears that dumb hairstyle that he will never admit has grown on him as often as possible. It’s different, seeing it down. She looks different. Somethin’…intimate about it. Mugen gives himself a mental shake. _What the hell am I doing?_   Why’s he thinking about her hair? Why’s he telling her about his language? Why does she care? _He_ doesn’t even care about it, he’s forgotten half the words already. He’s fucked up from almost dying, that’s all. Once he gets some sleep he’ll be back to normal.

“Well,” Fuu says, mustering a smile. “Goodnight.”

He means to say it back, but instead he says, “These kappa things…I seen signs about ‘em, maybe. Near ponds?”

Fuu brightens. “Yeah! The ones that tell kids not to get too close, right? Or they’ll grab you.” She makes a little claw with her hand and snatches at the air.

Honestly the signs could have said ‘eat my ass’ and he wouldn’t have known any different, but he remembers the drawings accompanying the words – little reptile-looking things, sometimes pulling children into the water, sometimes grinning evilly. He’d just thought it meant the turtles there were exceptional bastards. “So you think I look like a turtle and I like to drown kids, huh?”

“No! I mean, the turtle part, sure – “ she laughs at his sour face – “but now that you ask I think you’re like a cross between a kappa and a hyosube.”

Mugen sighs in frustration. “A _what_?”

“Okay – so hyosube are like kappa, right? They live in rivers and they’re known for being a nuisance. But instead of scaly, they’re hairy. And they’re more aggressive, they really like to fight.”

Fuu’s voice has risen to normal volume in her eagerness to teach him about Japanese culture, and Mugen’s been talking normal this whole time, so they’re definitely disrupting Jin’s sleep now. _Good, ya bastard. Teach you to steal my kill._ “Sounds like my kinda demon,” he says aloud.

Fuu continues. “And just like kappa, they like playing pranks on humans. For kappa, sometimes it’s just stuff like looking up kimonos. But hyosube are real nasty, so usually their pranks end up in death. They love eggplants, so if you grow them, hyosube will ransack your fields and eat them all. And they’ll sneak into your house and get their hair all over your bathtub. And if you disrespect them, you’ll die of fever. The only way to get them to leave you alone is to give them an offering.”

Mugen mulls this over, sticking a pinky in his ear and digging around. “Doesn’t sound like me.”

“Really?” Fuu starts counting on her fingers. “Good swimmer, rude, loves to fight, harasses women, mean for no reason, bottomless pit, hairy – “

“Come here and say that to my face, you little brat.”

“Wait, you didn’t let me finish! They’re not all bad. They can be really smart, and strong. You can find shrines where hyosube are honored for helping people in battle. And they’re not always mean, sometimes kappa bring fresh fish to people they like. If you help them, they’ll help you.” She adds, more quietly, “They’re honorable.”

He hadn’t noticed ‘til now – the ache in his side has become full-blown pain. “That doesn’t sound like me either,” he says finally.

Fuu gives him a sad, tentative little smile. “You don’t think so?”

Mugen stares at her for a few seconds, then rolls onto his back. Once he does, he feels lightheaded. Fuck, he hates this. He forgot what it was like to be pulled back from death. Everything’s _wrong_. Fuu edges up on his field of view, just barely. She’s a blur out of the corner of his eye. “You okay?” she asks softly.

“’M fine.” But he’s not, something’s not right – he really did wake up in the wrong body because one second he can barely feel it, and the next he _can_ and he’s so aware of what it is to be in it, every muscle and bone, the weight of his skull and the space his tongue takes up in his mouth, his heart beating in his chest.

“Are you…hurt?”

 _Stop talking_ , he thinks, and then: _keep talking._

“You’re weirding me out, Mugen. I’m sorry, okay?”

That dog, on the island. He looked into its round, dark eye and he saw nothing but anger, and pain, and fear. And his own face reflected there.

Fuu leans over him now, and he can see the worry in her big doe eyes, her eyebrows drawn together, her hair falling down around him. “Are you sick? What’s wrong?” she whispers, and he expects a hand on his cheek, or his forehead. But she doesn’t move, she doesn’t touch him.

Mugen closes his eyes and clenches his jaw. “I’m tired. Go to bed.” And he can hear her breathing, so he can tell she’s there, but he still wants to open his eyes and make sure. Because –

“Okay,” she says quietly, and he hears her returning to her bedroll. _What the fuck_ , he thinks, and he digs his nails into his palms a little but it does nothing. He still wants to look at her. Why? That bitch is nothing special, definitely not as cute as she thinks she is. Annoying and unappealing. Plus she’s obviously hot for Four Eyes, it’s so obvious it’s embarrassing. Which doesn’t matter, ‘cause Mugen doesn’t give a shit. She could fuck all of Japan and he wouldn’t care. As long as – fuck. As long as she never said that shit to him again. Because –

“Mugen?” comes her voice, small. He doesn’t move, doesn’t respond. Let her think he’s asleep. It’s a long couple moments until he hears her move again, shifting a little to get comfortable. And then she’s silent. It’s another long couple minutes until Mugen gives in and turns his head slightly, so he can see her out of the corner of his eye. It’s dark, so he can’t see nothin’ really, just the vague shape of her under her blanket. Her face, her hair. He turns away, but then Jin’s in his line of vision. Lying on his back, hands folded neatly on his stomach. That faker. Probably listened to the whole conversation.

Fuck them. Fuck the both of them. He saw how they looked at him when Mukuro told them about his past. He saw that Fuu had moved behind Jin, or Jin moved in front of Fuu, he didn’t know which. And it didn’t matter anyway. They looked at him like they didn’t know him. And you know what? They _don’t_. He knows they’ve always thought he was trash, and he never gave a shit. But now he’s ‘honorable’? Now they wanna avenge him? Wanna pretend they care? Fuck them.

There’s some muscle ticking in Mugen’s jaw, and his fingers keep twitching, like his skin can’t hold him. He doesn’t wanna sleep, he wants to fight. He wants to pay back Four Eyes for killing Mukuro, when it should’ve been _Mugen_ , _he_ should’ve been the one who –

He kicks off his blanket and goes outside, not caring if he wakes up the other two. The breeze coming off the ocean hits his face when he steps out. His skin prickles. He used to like the ocean breeze, because seafaring was the only thing he enjoyed, and pirating was the only thing he was ever good at. Now he hates it, because it reminds him of the island. Mukuro, Kohza. The village. That dog. His shitty fucking life, and the stain it left on him, as permanent as his prison tattoos. The smell of salt on the wind is strong, even though he can’t see the beach from here. It’s all darkness out there. Fuck it, he's going. He can't be in there with them.

He's realizing, now, that he's barely looked away from Fuu and Jin all night. That if he wasn't looking at one, he was looking at the other. Because – it was their faces he saw when he was dying.

Mugen gets down to the beach, down to the water’s edge, and looks out over the dark ocean for a long time. It’s a clear night, but he refuses to look up at the sky.

_“It’s not right that they’re so beautiful. Not when we’re this sad down here.”_

He hopes Kohza threw herself into the ocean. He hopes Mijjinukam swallowed her up. And while he’s at it, swallowed up the Ryukyus too. But standing there listening to the gentle waves, Mugen knows there’s no way Mijjinukam is out there. Or any other kam. There’s only one god, and that’s Death.

That dog. Crying, bleeding. Angry and scared. And Mugen had taken his sword – not a real blade, not yet – and he had put his face close to the dog’s, and looked directly into its eye when he slit its throat. He had watched the life fade away, watched whatever it had for a soul leave its body, watched until that black glass clouded over and he couldn’t see himself any more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The kappa signs are probably anachronistic, but that's pretty typical for Samurai Champloo. You can still find them across Japan today.
> 
> The Roman Album for the show confirms that Mugen is specifically from the Miyako Islands, a group of islands in the Ryukyu Kingdom much closer to China than to Japan. Mugen's discussion of Ryukyuan language/mythology is yoinked straight from Russian linguist Nikolai Nevsky's Miyakoan Dictionary, which is available online if you're interested in that kind of thing.


	3. Nyonin kekkai (15)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nyonin kekkai = "no women admitted."
> 
> Covers Bogus Booty.

-:-

15: Fuu 

-:- 

“Alright,” Mugen huffs four days after getting blown up and subsequently drowning. “Enough of this shit. I’m healed. Let’s go.”

Fuu looks up from the little sand castle/heap she’d been constructing. “You are _not_ healed,” she retorts.

“Am so.”

“You could barely walk two days ago!”

“And today I’m fine. Look, you wanna get out of this boring shithole or not?”

Well...it’s not like she doesn’t wanna leave too. Having spent a couple days now in the abandoned village, she can say for a fact that it hasn’t gotten any less creepy or sad. And she would like to make it to Nagasaki as soon as possible. But she figured if they were going to wait here for a few days for Mugen to get better anyway, she might as well make the most of it. Like a little vacation. So she’s relaxed in the sun, drawn pictures in the sand, made sand sculptures. She’s waded in the ocean and collected pretty rocks and shells. As soon as Momo’s awake in the evenings, they play tag around the beach. She’s even swum a little at night, shivering in the freezing water, but feeling like something out of a story with the moon shining down, her hair fanning out around her.

It all would have been really nice - if not for _those two_ . While Fuu has been relaxing, Jin just endlessly sharpens his swords, and all Mugen does is skip rocks, or more likely throw them at stuff. They’ve both been getting very _testy_. Jin has never been an amazing conversationalist, but he barely says two words to her now when she tries to engage him. On the other hand, she and Mugen can’t stop arguing. He vehemently protests all of her very sensible – and casual! – suggestions that he take it easy. And last night while she was playing with Momo, he yelled at her to knock it off and find them some food. Like she’s their servant?? Oh, and, _and,_  every time Jin and Mugen so much as look at each other, they’re drawing their swords and threatening death.

So yes – leaving sounds like a great idea.

Fuu considers Mugen, lying on the sand, bouncing his foot as it balances on his other leg. He _looks_ healed, more or less. She looks over at Jin to confirm that this is a bad idea, but the ronin just shakes his head. “Okay,” she says. “Let’s see if we can find someone to take us across. We don’t have money to pay them, but...maybe they’ll take pity on us.”

Mugen gets to his feet, shaking sand out of his clothes. “No need. I’ll sail us across.”

Fuu and Jin’s voices overlap. “That’s _dumb_ ” is eclipsed by “And which of these do you plan to sail?” Jin nods his head toward the fragments of boats that litter the beach.

“I found one before, I’ll find another,” Mugen says dismissively, much more animated now that Fuu’s (kind of) given the okay. He swings an arm up behind his head to stretch it, already looking out at the water. “You and me are gonna check the beach for boats that ain’t broken in half,” he says to Jin. “And you,” he points at Fuu, “look in the village and see if you can find an oar. A long one, I’m talking like ten shaku. It’s gonna be bent in the middle, with a long flat paddle. You got that?”

“Why don’t we just get a ride with someone who already _has_ a boat?” Fuu asks, but Mugen shoos her away.

Grumbling, she goes off to the village to look for an oar, and manages to find one like Mugen described. She very carefully maneuvers it out through the doorway, hefts it over her shoulder, and carries it out to the beach. Mugen and Jin have already found a boat - a fishing skiff, just big enough to fit the three of them. No sail, though. Fuu presents her oar for inspection, and Mugen nods his approval, which shouldn’t make her as pleased as it does. The boys carry the boat down to the water while Fuu goes back to the hut to gather their stuff, plus look for more food. Not much luck on that end. She packs light, considering the size of their boat, and the fact that it looks like Mugen is planning to just row them all the way there. Sure, he’s strong, but it’ll take them hours to get across the bay without a sail. Plus he’s definitely still injured. _This is a bad plan_ , she thinks for at least the tenth time.

Returning to the boat at the water’s edge, she tucks all their stuff under the seats, then waits for further instruction. This is Mugen’s show, after all. What the vagrant does, though, is start disrobing. He shrugs out of his haori, kicks off his geta, and tosses both in the boat. Fuu watches dumbly for a second before realizing that yes, they will have to walk out into the water, and yes, her clothes will get wet if she doesn’t follow Mugen’s example. She slips out of her own sandals, tosses them in the boat as Mugen did, then sets about rolling her kimono up. She tucks it in for good measure, making sure it doesn’t fall down and drag in the water, and trying her best to make sure she doesn’t flash anyone.

While Mugen and Fuu are prepping, Jin’s still just standing there. She wonders why, until she catches him considering his own sandals. Oh. She and Mugen can roll or hike up their clothes and slip off their footwear, but Jin wears tabi. They’re kind of a pain to get in and out of, what with the kohaze clasps in the back. But it would be worse to keep them on and walk through the water. Ugh, Fuu wouldn’t wish wet socks on her worst enemy. “Just take them off, Jin,” she suggests. The ronin sighs through his nose and does so, slipping out of his zori and sitting down on the beach to deal with the clasps.

Mugen’s already pushing the boat out into the water. “Are you girls finished?” he tosses over his shoulder. Fuu sticks her tongue out at his back.

Jin, having dealt with his tabi, gets up and begins rolling his hakama. “You want some help with that?” Fuu offers. “I can show you how I do it. I’ve gotten pretty good at tucking so it doesn’t fall down.”

“I’ll be fine,” Jin assures.

Shrugging, Fuu gives herself one last once-over, then wades out to join Mugen. She hears Jin follow soon after. Mugen hasn’t pushed the boat very far out, so his shorts and Fuu’s kimono remain nice and dry. Jin’s hakama have unrolled and are totally soaked from the knee down. Mugen climbs in first, taking up his position at the back of the boat, and then Jin, who trails water everywhere but does a great job pretending he isn’t. He sits at the front.

Getting in turns out to be a little trickier for Fuu. She tries swinging a leg over the side, but she doesn’t quite have the height or the leverage to go further. Stuck with one leg in the water and the other hooked over the side of the boat, Fuu makes the executive decision to use her surroundings. She grabs the back of Jin’s haori and pulls, bringing her other leg over. The ronin grunts a little in surprise or indignation, but remains steady, as she knew he would. “Sorry, sorry,” she placates. As soon as she’s wobbled her way in she sits on the bench in the middle of the boat and pulls down her kimono, arranging it around its proper place at her shins. “Okay,” she says, turning to Mugen, who rolls his eyes, but sets the oar at the back of the boat and pushes them off.

Fuu watches, curious. She’s never seen this up close. Once they’re a little ways out and the water darkens, Mugen stops shoving them along and adjusts his stance. He begins moving the oar in a big figure eight motion, which doesn’t seem to move the boat much at all at first, but as his motions gradually speed up and smooth out they get going at a decent pace. He’s probably making it look easier than it is. The more she watches, the more she notices his wristwork, and the way he puts his whole body into the motion. It must take a lot of strength. The rounded pull of muscles in his upper arms, not usually visible under his haori, flex rhythmically.

Mugen gaze catches hers. “What?”

 _Yeah, Fuu – what?_ Her inner voice challenges. “Nothing,” she says, and it _was_ nothing! She was just looking at his arms. What’s wrong with that? _Maybe let’s focus on something else._ Just to give herself something to do, she eats a couple apples.

She is actually really excited to be on a boat. Well, okay, obviously she’s been on boats before, but it’s not like she was sailing the high seas on her days off at the teahouse. They’ve all been slow river boats, like ferries. This one’s meant for deep water, and boy is it deep. Fuu’s sure she’s never been out this far before. She peers over the side and tries to imagine how long it would take to swim to the bottom. Scary. But she likes the wind in her hair, the billowing of the sails, the gentle partition of water around the boat, the cries of seabirds. She trails her fingers through the water, enjoying the sensation, at least until the mental image of a huge fish coming up from the depths to eat her hand has her yanking it back. It’s weird that Mugen did this for a living. They really did lead different lives before they met up.

Enjoying the air and the pleasant motion of the boat, it’s a while before Fuu thinks to check up on the former pirate. They’re still going at the same steady pace, so nothing seems off until she takes a good look at his face. He’s really...pale. And sweaty.

“What now?” he grunts.

“You don’t look so good,” she says, frowning.

“You ain’t nothin’ to look at either.”

“That’s not what I meant!”

“I know,” Mugen sneers. “Lay off. I’ve been rowing for an hour, whaddayou expect?”

“You’re not healed! I _told_ you this was a bad idea!” Fuu stands, rocking the boat, and marches over to him – rocking the boat further, forcing Jin to grip the side – and grabs for the oar. Mugen reflexively holds it away from her. “Let me help.”

“This ain’t a two person job.”

“Then let me row for a while. Or Jin.”

“Fishface couldn’t row his way out of a bathtub.”

“Then me!” Fuu repeats, getting irritated, drowning out Jin’s objection to the insult. She reaches for the oar again, fully expecting Mugen to hold it out of her reach again, but instead he practically shoves it into her hands.

“You wanna row? Have at it.”

Ignoring her bewilderment, he moves around her and takes the seat she’d been occupying. Then, to add injury to insult, he gives her shin a nudge with his foot. “Let’s go, we don’t have all day.”

“Well – but I – “ Fuu begins to protest, confused at this turn of events, while Mugen makes himself comfortable on the bench.

“Perhaps I should take over instead,” Jin suggests.

Fuu’s first instinct is to thank him, hand off the oar – but she stops herself. She offered, and she’s as good as her word. She squares her shoulders. “Thanks, but I’ve got it.”

Jin inclines his head slightly. “If you’re certain.”

“You heard her,” says Mugen, looking straight at her. “She’s got it.”

Narrowing her eyes at him, Fuu feels a surge of aggravation, and then an even bigger surge of determination. She can do this. Shoving her sleeves up once more, she widens her stance and tries to copy Mugen’s figure eight motion. At first, the boat does nothing more than wiggle back and forth. But to her delight, after a few moments they actually start to move. _See? I can do this!_ She may not have Mugen’s strength, stamina, or skill, but she can make up for all of that with sheer willpower.

They’re going...really slow. But they _are_ going, and that gives her the encouragement she needs to keep at it, even if after just a few minutes her biceps are burning with strain. She’s also getting super hot, which besides being uncomfortable is just not a cute look. She’s very seriously considering joining Jin in his sorry state and just jumping into the water fully clothed. _Maybe when we get closer to shore. Which can’t be far now – whoops, should not have looked at the shore. That is...very far. Okay, don’t think about distance, just think about rowing. You got this._

She keeps up a little internal dialogue of encouragements, staring at a point on the horizon and letting her vision unfocus. She even comes up with a little chant: _Fuu is the strongest! Fuu is the best! Fuu lasts the longest! Fuu beats the rest!_

Some amount of time – she truly couldn’t say how much – passes before she’s interrupted. “Okay, enough,” Mugen says.

Fuu keeps rowing, but focuses in on him. He’s definitely less pale, but he doesn’t look all the way recovered. Not that she’s one to talk – she’s probably beet-red and shiny with sweat. _A small price to pay for proving Mugen wrong!_ “I’m fine, I can keep going,” she says nonchalantly.

“At this point, we’ll get there next week. Give me the oar.”

She holds it away from him. Deja vu. “New plan. It’s really dumb for just one of us to row the whole way when the other two of us who _weren’t_ blown up are perfectly willing to help out. So we’re gonna take turns. And when it’s not your turn, you can coach me and Jin. Okay?”

For a moment Mugen's scowl looks almost...uncomfortable. Then it's just venemous. “No. You both suck at this.”

“Hey, I did a _great_ job for someone who’s never done it before!” Fuu argues. “And you haven’t even seen Jin row yet.”

“Don’t need to, Tomato Face. I’ve seen him swing a sword.”

Fuu feels her cheeks get redder – if that’s even possible – but she’s thrown off any potential retort by the sting of embarrassment. Jin, on the other hand, has apparently taken all the insults he can today. “By that logic, being able to row should make _you_ a competent swordsman,” he returns icily. “Yet here we are.”

“Wow, you really got me with that one. I’m gutted here.”

“If only that were true.”

“Hey, I got an idea. Everyone who managed to get into the boat without getting wet can row. Everyone else can suck my dick.”

“The depths of your vulgarity continue to amaze me.”

Mugen stands abruptly. “I’ll send _you_ to the depths, you lil’ bitch.”

“Hey,” says Fuu.

Jin stands too and puts a hand on the hilt of his katana. “I welcome you to try. Perhaps if I sink down far enough, we will finally be on the same level.”

“I’m happy to put you back where you came from, I’m sure the other hagfish all miss you down there.”

“Hey!” says Fuu.

“The hagfish would be better company. And more pleasant to look at.”

Mugen draws his sword. “After you’re dead I’m thinkin’ we’ll replace you with a giant pile of shit. It’ll be like I never killed you. Only I did.”

“I have no plans to replace you. It would be cruel to remove trash from the world only to dump more later.”

“HEY! Knock it off!!” Fuu kicks at her closest problem, which happens to be Mugen.

“Ow, bitch,” he complains.

“I swear, you’re both twelve! Jin, it’s your turn to row. Mugen, no insults. Just give him pointers.”

“He insulted me too!” Mugen protests, pointing.

“You _started_ it! Jin’s an idiot for responding but this is mostly on you!”

“Hey,” Jin murmurs, eyes narrowing.

“Okay, _both of you_ have been on my last nerve for like three days! Now I have come up with a great plan that will get us to Ise and you two are going to follow it! You got that??”

Extremely resentful, after a few moments the two men put away their weapons. Jin makes his way to the back of the boat, and Fuu takes his place at the front. Leaning over the side of the boat, she splashes some water on her burning face, sighing audibly in relief, tuning out the ambient noise of _“no, I said left” – “this_ _is_ _left” – “then I meant up” – “up and left are two completely different – ”_ and so on.

The turn system works out well. Fuu ends up rowing the least, but she figures that’s fair because she came up with the plan. Jin is...not amazing at it, but with Mugen’s not-so-gentle coaching he attains competency. And Mugen gets enough rest in between his long turns that Fuu’s pretty sure he won’t pass out and fall in the water. They divvy up their remaining fruit and no one argues about their share. All in all, a success.

When they land at Ise, before she can ask, Mugen hauls her up onto the dock.

...

Fuu skids into the room. “Look at this!” She snaps open the map of Ise in her hands and points to a spot in the middle. “We’re right next to Ise Jingu!”

“Ise who now,” Mugen grumbles from his futon, still half-asleep.

“The shrine!” Fuu drops to her knees at the table and spreads the map out before Jin, who is nursing a cup of tea. “It’s like the biggest in Japan! People used to come into the teahouse talking about it. It’s famous. There’s a saying: ‘you have to visit Ise Jingu once in your life.’ Jeez, haven’t you guys heard of it?”

“I’m aware of the shrine,” says Jin, the little smart-aleck. “But I’m beginning to believe you were not.”

“I – yeah, okay, I didn’t know it was here, but I _did_ know about it! It has...a mirror or something? I just think it would be cool to see. And look,” she points to the map again, “it’s practically just down the street.”

Jins hums thoughtfully.

“So? Yes?”

“I suppose I would like to see it as well,” he acquiesces.

“Plus we can get some food, since these cheapskates won’t feed us again.” When they came into town yesterday, they had to trade cleaning services for a night in this tiny inn run by a surprisingly mercenary elderly couple, who promised only one meal along with this room. And given that the three of them hadn’t eaten in hours, had rowed most of the day, and then broke their backs cleaning, they chose to have dinner last night.

Jin frowns. “We don’t have money for food.”

“Well there’s where you’re wrong,” Fuu says proudly. “I told the old man we were going to the shrine and talked him into giving us a few mon for the offering.”

“Ah.” Jin seems the smallest bit impressed.

“And in exchange for scrubbing the baths. So. We have to do that.”

“...ah.”

“And um...we should probably do it now. Because he said we had to.”

Jin gives her a look that she pretends not to see. “Look, I tried negotiating but he wouldn’t budge!” The look intensifies as she avoids it. “I didn’t see you coming up with a way to earn us money!” she says defensively to the door.

The ronin sighs through his nose and rises. “Fine. If we work diligently we will be done quickly.”

“That’s the spirit! Come on, Mugen.”

Dead silence.

“He’s asleep,” Jin supplies helpfully.

Fuu gets up and approaches Mugen to shake him awake, but hesitates with her hands in mid-air. He cleaned yesterday without complaining (much), but he’s probably still tired from doing most of the rowing. And no matter what he says he is _not_ healed. Plus, buried under the blanket, with his face all slack like that, he looks...kinda peaceful. She’s feeling much more charitable toward him ever since he decided to shape up yesterday. She thinks he’s just been an ass lately because he was restless; he’s one of the laziest bozos she’s ever met, and sometimes he’s downright unmoveable, but only when it’s his choice. “Maybe we could let him sleep,” she suggests. “He did get us across the bay.”

She can feel Jin giving her Another Look, but he doesn’t outright protest. So she and Jin scrub the baths. And it sucks, but it does go quickly with the two of them. Maybe not as quickly as it would’ve with Mugen, but they get into a comfortable rhythm and they work around each other seamlessly. _We make a good team_ , she thinks, and it warms her heart.

They return to the room and Fuu leaves a note for their other companion:

_Mugen,_

_We went to the shrine. I left a map, so find us if you wake up before we’re back. We might also be getting food._

She lingers again in the doorway. “Do you think we should bring him something back?”

A cold wind seems to blow through the corridor. “If you don’t work, you don’t eat,” Jin says stonily, and departs.

Fuu shivers, wrapping her kimono tighter around her as she follows. _This place is haunted by a very tightfisted spirit_ , she decides.

The bridge to the shrine is packed with people, as many have stopped to bow at the torii gate looming over the entrance. Among them, several women are standing around the gate, handing out papers to everyone going in. “Important information!” the young woman nearest Fuu calls out. Fuu moves toward her and receives a piece of paper and a smile. “If you can’t read it, have your husband read it to you,” the woman advises.

“Husband?” Fuu wonders aloud, but is ushered along by Jin’s hand on her elbow to maintain the flow of traffic.

Passing through the torii gate on the other side of the bridge, Fuu examines the pamphlet. It’s a guide for what to do and what not to do at the shrine. Pretty self-explanatory. Gosh, she always forgets how many rules there are. _Those who are sick should not enter the shrine. Those who are mourning should not enter the shrine. Women who are menstruating should not enter the shrine. Men with menstruating wives should not enter the shrine._

Frowning, Fuu folds up the pamphlet. It’s a pretty standard warning, she’s seen it before, but it always makes her think of the time she wandered into a street sermon from a Buddhist nun who told the crowd, in the sweetest voice, that women were inherently polluted. Their womb blood tainted sacred earth. That they were damned to the Blood Pool Hell, and only the sutra could save them.

Experiencing a tiny, irrational stab of worry, Fuu reminds herself she’s not due to start for at least another week.

What would Jin have to say about all of that? She kind of wants to ask him. _No way_ _. That would be mortifying_. There are other things to think about. Proper shrine etiquette. What she’s going to pray for. What they’re going to have for lunch. It’s warm today. It’d be nice to have a contrast. Cold soba? Sushi? Something sweet, maybe. The thought of food, as always, puts a smile on Fuu’s face, and she doesn’t mind the long walk up the winding path to the shrine.

…

How many times can the same thing happen to one girl? Fuu is sick and tired of being left all by herself while those two go off and do whatever they want. And hungry – she’s so hungry!!

It _had_ been a great day. First they found the lake teeming with fish, and she and Mugen pulled them in like...well, like they were fish in a barrel. And lo and behold, Jin couldn’t fish to save his life. Fuu wanted to laugh, and pat him on the back, and then laugh some more because Mugen’s impression was just perfect. And then Jin, the saint that he was, found the bag of gold coins. Fuu could have wept from joy. They’d never have to go hungry again! They wouldn’t have to work, or beg, or scrounge! And Osaka was pretty, and they ate so much good food, and they were all getting along really well – and they ditched her. Again. This time to spend all their money on prostitutes.

Honestly? Fuu is not a fan.

Momo, her only _true_ friend, is a comforting weight on her shoulder. “How could they even think of going to the red light district when they’ve got me around?” she complains. But it’s rhetorical. She knows why. She just isn’t what they want in a woman. Or a traveling companion. Maybe they would like her more if she were a boy.

Sullen, she buries her face in her knees. “Being a woman is a disadvantage.” Then, realizing she has no idea if Mom can actually commiserate, she addresses the flying squirrel. “Hey Momo, are you a boy or a girl?”

All Momo does is chirp and place a reassuring paw on her temple. Great.

Whatever. This is just what they do. Staring out over the unfamiliar city, the oversaturated red and yellow lights blurring together in her vision, Fuu feels...something she doesn’t wanna feel. Hollow, kind of. She buries her face again. “I’m so hungry,” she mumbles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shaku are a unit of measurement. One shaku is, conveniently, almost exactly one foot.
> 
> Tabi are traditional ankle-high socks with a separation between the big toe and the other toes (so they can be worn with sandals). They’re form-fitting and more rigid than other socks, so they have clasps at the back called kohaze.
> 
> Zori are flat sandals similar to flip-flops. They can be worn with or without tabi.
> 
> Menstruating women, and their husbands, were indeed discouraged from visiting shrines in pre-modern Japan. In fact women were pretty routinely banned from sacred sites. There’s a few left in Japan today, including a World Heritage Site, where women are still not allowed.
> 
> The Blood Pool Hell was also a real belief.
> 
> The alternate title for this chapter is “Fuu Performs Unpaid Emotional Labor.” Or “Fuu and the Endless Microaggressions.”


	4. Shoshi kantetsu (16 - 17)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shoshi kantetsu = "To achieve the purpose, goal or commitment you made to the end without giving up."
> 
> Covers Lullabies of the Lost (Part 1 & 2).

-:-

16 & 17: Jin

-:-

Jin moves into position, pivoting to face his opponent, hand falling to the hilt of his katana. A move he’s made a thousand times. But this time – he will put an end to this injustice once and for all. It is his duty as a samurai. His obligation as a man.

“I can’t overlook that ‘silent poindexter’ comment,” he mutters.

“You’re mad about _that_?” Fuu squawks from behind him.

Here they are again. It seems they can’t go more than a few days without some big fight like this – Fuu lobbing accusations, ceaselessly frustrated with her bodyguards even though she picked them herself, and Mugen tossing insults at anyone and everyone. Including the sunflower samurai – “Why do you wanna find a pansy like that, anyway?” Mugen mocks.

“Nghaaah! He’s not like that!” Fuu gesticulates wildly.

“What’s he like, then?!” Mugen demands.

She wilts, mumbling, as she always does when pressed about the samurai.

Mugen turns away smugly. “See what I mean? You don’t know anything about him either.”

But this is troubling information for Jin. “Don’t tell me you don’t even know what he looks like…” That would put their chances of finding him at – what, zero percent?

Fuu stays silent.

It’s hopeless then. During some of their more tedious days of walking, Jin had felt that this journey was endless. But he hadn’t thought it would literally have no end. How do you find a man you know nothing about?

Mugen asks a different question. “How come you’re so desperate to find this guy when you don’t even know for sure if he’s alive or dead?”

“He’s alive!” Fuu bursts suddenly. There’s true conviction in her voice. “Until I find him and beat him up, he’s gonna stay alive no matter what.”

Another surprise. The more he learns about the sunflower samurai, the less Jin understands. “This is about revenge?”

Fuu turns away. “What’s it matter to you?”

Jin would have said…something to that. But Mugen cuts in, implying the sunflower samurai disgraced her, then threw her away.

And that, of all things, is the tipping point.

“Oh, okay,” Fuu says, deceptively calm. “Now I get it. It’s all clear to me now!” She practically throws her pointer finger at them in accusation. “Listen, you two are nothing more than hired muscle, so I'm gonna trade up to tougher models! I'm trading up!”

And Mugen, who has no idea how to de-escalate, insults her one more time and declares that he “quits”.

Jin is, admittedly, a little blindsided. “Hey,” he says, trying to bring them to their senses. What is happening here?

Fuu takes the ball and runs with it, dismissing them formally, even performing a mocking little bow. Without waiting for a response, she begins walking away. Mugen growls out his own goodbye and stalks off.

“Hey…!” Jin says again, although it stops neither of them. They only get further away, Fuu yelling out a few more insults in the distance like she can’t help herself.

So. That’s it. On the one hand, history proves they’ll fall back together somehow. On the other hand, this felt very…final. An impasse. Jin considers the paths before him. He’s been dismissed from service, he can’t follow Fuu. He has no desire to follow Mugen. Resigned, Jin turns and walks back.

If he were a more imaginative man, he would find poetry in the parallel between the sunset that washes the landscape in muted orange and yellow, and the sunset of his time with Mugen and Fuu. There would be something meaningful in the way that each of them took a diverging path; Mugen forging ahead on his predetermined route, Fuu choosing to walk the less-traveled road, and Jin going back the way he came.

As it is, Jin is not an imaginative man, so his primary concern is finding shelter for the night. Although these woods may not hold the ghosts of famous samurai, there are the elements to contend with. Once he finds shelter, he can determine what to do next.

…

Twilight has set in. Any lingering light is lost in the canopy of trees. The forest is quiet, which is unusual; there should be plenty of noise from insects, birds…these mountains are indeed a strange place. Perhaps he will walk a little longer, find a way out of the forest –

Someone is following him.

Much faster than he anticipated, his assailant is upon him. Their blades clash, the sound ringing through the trees, before Jin breaks away to reassert himself. The other man follows closely, and they take quick swipes at each other. Jin’s are purely exploratory, holding off the other man until he can figure out who it is. Someone from the Mujushin dojo, no doubt. Yes, the style is familiar. Very familiar…

Jin delivers a blow that staggers them both, giving himself time to assess his opponent’s appearance for the first time. It’s difficult to see in the dark, but the kamon –

A scream, from somewhere not too far away. _Fuu_.

In the moment that Jin’s attention is diverted, the masked man rushes him, and yet again their swords clang. Jin’s parry is imprecise. The imperfect angle of his blade serves an unintended purpose, as the cut cloth falls away from the man’s face.

Yukimaru.

Ah.

So, even Yukimaru.

Jin is there, and he is not. His movements are automatic.

_Their bokken clash, and lock. They have been at this for hours. Sweat beads along Yukimaru’s hairline, his only outward sign of exhaustion, the only one he can’t hide. They will have to be awake early tomorrow. Jin should end this. He could hitch his wrist, break the hold, sidestep, throw Yukimaru off balance. It would only take a few moves to catch him fully off guard then. But he does not. They remain locked, straining against each other._

_A single drop of perspiration rolls down Jin’s own temple._

Yukimaru advances, Jin retreats. “Why do you keep running away?” the other man demands.

_Hours later, too exhausted to continue, nearly too tired to hold their swords, is when Jin lands his last strike. His bokken taps Yukimaru’s spine. They bow._

“I have no desire to kill you.”

“You aren’t good enough to kill me.”

_“I’m nearly as tall as you now,” Yukimaru notes with satisfaction, running a flat hand from the top of his head towards Jin. The side of his pinky finger bumps against Jin’s nose. “I’ll be able to beat you soon.”_

_“It’s not height that determines a spar,” Jin says._

_“Maybe not,” the lighter-haired boy concedes. “But when we’re the same height we’ll know for sure. I’ll win on skill alone.”_

_Jin lays a hand on top of Yukimaru’s head, a rare show of affection. When they’re of equal stature he won’t be able to do this anymore. “I look forward to it.”_

_But Yukimaru never reaches Jin’s height. There is always the smallest distance between them._

Jin’s voice is steady, cool. “You aren’t worth killing.” The grit of Yukimaru’s teeth is audible. “If I killed you, it would only tarnish my sword.”

Yukimaru rushes him, as expected, with murder in his eyes. He swings for Jin, who weaves and blocks, moving ever backward. “I won’t always be the same little boy I used to be!” He presses ever forward. “Your time in the sun is over!” he proclaims, and delivers the final blow.

Jin feels a surge of pity – for Yukimaru, for himself. _What time in the sun?_ He wonders. _I have spent all this time in darkness._ Hah. Yukimaru would appreciate the histrionic prose, he always had a flair for the dramatic. He liked death poems much better than history lessons.

Their blades cross. Yukimaru’s at his throat, and his at Yukimaru’s. The sound of the waterfall drowns out all other noise. “What’s the matter?” Jin intones.

Yukimaru holds his stance, but his face is angled back from the point of Jin’s katana, eyes fixed on it, something other than anger and arrogance in them for the first time. The immediacy of death, finally apparent. No poetry there.

A performance, then. “Shall we continue and go to Hell together?” Jin asks. He lowers his katana. Yukimaru remains unmoving, unblinking. “Say that you killed me if you like.” He sheathes his blade, and turns toward the rushing water. “I might as well be dead already.”

Then he falls.

…

It would be completely disingenuous to say that Jin expected to die. But it would be equally disingenuous to say that he was sure he would live.

When he finally surfaces, gasping for air, he’s a good distance away from the waterfall. Mostly uninjured, as far as he can tell. He lets the current carry him further, until it slows and the river becomes shallower. He finds his footing, and trudges through the water to the opposite side of the river. He has no illusions that Yukimaru will come looking for him, even if only to confirm the kill, and perform funeral rites. Whatever else has changed, Yukimaru would do at least that much for him.

Something catches his eye as he approaches the far bank. A small object, bobbing in the water, caught in a tiny inlet. A slipper. Fuu’s.

She screamed earlier, he remembers. A few hours without her bodyguards and she’s in trouble again. Or perhaps…

Fuu is fragile. Not strong, not a good swimmer. Not even lucky. If she fell from the height that he did, it’s possible that she…

Jin stands there for a few moments longer. He’s not sure what to feel, other than tired. His very bones ache; perhaps he was injured during his fall after all. He reaches down and takes the slipper, sodden as it is, and puts it inside his kosode. _Enough_. Either she’s alive, or she isn’t. If she is, he can return it to her. If she isn’t, it will be his offering. He won’t get too attached to either outcome.

Jin begins walking along the riverbank, eyes searching this shore and the far one. It would be smart to disappear into the forest to evade Yukimaru, but this is not his primary concern any longer. He’ll walk along the river to find Fuu’s body. He owes that to her. And it is something…to do. If Fuu is dead, or even if she isn’t, he is no longer traveling with her and Mugen anyway. He has no other purpose than survival.

And – yes, his swords. He should dry them. They have been in his family for generations. He will not be the one to let them rust.

…

Following the man to the clearing proved fruitless. Matsumae-han officials looking for a fugitive, having mistaken Mugen for their man. Nothing to do with Fuu. He had entertained the brief idea that she was not dead – kidnapped, instead, as she often was. Her slipper lost in the struggle.

He’s shifted his priorities to Mugen. Not to warn him, but because he just now remembered their unfinished business. First, they’ll search for Fuu. It crosses Jin’s mind that Mugen won’t care enough to search, but for some reason he doesn’t think that will be the case. Fuu is – was – important to Mugen, in some way. He would not have stuck around otherwise.

Then, once they’ve found her, given her a decent burial, they can settle their dispute. Hopefully Jin can convince Mugen to wait until they’ve left the forest, or their fight will attract Yukimaru’s attention. Is it even possible for Mugen to wait for anything? Is it possible to travel together any distance without Fuu? She was the one who broke up their arguments, and it was the promise to her that staid their hands – or Jin would have killed Mugen long ago. Surely.

They weren’t meant to be companions, the three of them. It was bound to end this way. Fuu forced it, even with ample evidence it wouldn’t work. She held them together, so tightly they sprung apart when she loosened her grip. So. He will find Mugen, and together they’ll find Fuu. And then he’ll kill Mugen, as he promised. And if Mugen doesn’t manage to kill him as well, then he’ll continue. Find a new place. Perhaps keep going west. Nothing to distract him, no promises to hold him down.

He remembers, now, what he thought about before he met the two of them. A road stretching before him, empty. Endless.

A shrill cry echoes through the trees, ricocheting off stone so that it seems to come from everywhere at once. It’s her. Unlike last time, this scream truly startles Jin – because he had really begun to believe she had not lived. He hurries towards the sound, convinced that if she wasn’t dead before she will be soon. But when he finally finds Fuu, sprawled at the mouth of a cave, she is alone and seemingly uninjured.

“Hey,” he says to catch her attention as he approaches.

Her eyes swivel to him. “Jin!” she exclaims, sounding almost relieved. As if it was he who was presumed dead.

“What happened?”

She babbles something about a figure carrying a sword on the far bank, but before Jin can begin to understand what she’s talking about, she asks in a much more accusatory tone, “Or more to the point, what the heck are you doing here?”

The question throws him. What is he doing here? Isn’t that obvious? She was in danger. So he came. Rather than answer, Jin turns the question on her.

“That’s none of your business,” she says petulantly. Ah. That’s right. They’re no longer companions, and she’s still upset. “Something tells me you didn’t finally feel sorry and come back to me.”

Jin retrieves her slipper from his kosode. “I thought you might have drowned,” he says truthfully. Fuu makes a disbelieving noise, looking betrayed. “It was floating in the river,” he adds.

“And you were gonna keep it as a memento of me or something?” she asks, rising and dusting herself off.

Jin tells her what he had planned if she had been dead – an offering. This doesn’t seem to please her, but neither does it make her angry. She even thanks him, though she looks resigned about it. Their hands touch as he returns her slipper, and those three things – his hand, her hand, the slipper – put into perspective how small Fuu is. Thin fingers, a delicate wrist. _Fragile_ , he thinks again. Fuu makes another surprised noise, asks about a cut on his arm. She seems to think Mugen gave it to him. He tells her where he really got it, and she expresses amazement at his survival. Funny. What’s truly amazing is that she lived through this night. She has been in the water, he can tell by the slightly damp state of her kimono. If she survived a fall into the river, she probably had help. Mugen.

He asks her at the same time she asks him, but neither of them have seen the vagrant. There’s a somber moment of silence.

Fuu’s mood turns in an instant, brightening, as she starts on about ‘medicinal herbs.’ She hurries off to find some, and Jin surveys her camp. No – not hers. The fire he could believe, the bed of leaves maybe, but the blanket isn’t Fuu’s. She did have help, then. Perhaps it is not luck that protects Fuu. Perhaps it is her ability to gather people to her.

For the second time tonight, Jin’s instincts save him with a split second to spare.

He draws his sword and pivots out of the way just as Yukimaru comes down on him from the trees. The younger man hits the ground hard, and Jin waits before he makes a sweeping strike that he knows Yukimaru can block. They stagger apart, and Fuu’s light footsteps come up behind him, drawn by the sound of their swords clashing. She asks frantically what’s going on, but Jin pays her no mind. He will explain. Later.

“Did you think you could fool me?” Yukimaru challenges. Jin remains silent. He knew, perhaps, that it would come to this no matter what he intended. The younger man explains the significance of the mountains they’ve come to be in. Rebirth and death. Jin wonders if Yukimaru planned to meet him here, or if it was fate. “Are you looking to be reborn, too?” Yukimaru challenges.

Jin murmurs the boy’s name. Why, he isn’t sure. An entreaty, an apology, a prayer.

“You won’t truly be dead until I kill you with my own two hands!” Yukimaru declares, and Jin thinks that there might be some truth in that.

They trade blows. It is true that Yukimaru has improved, but there has only ever been one victor between them. Jin draws him further away from Fuu, toward an open space by the river. “Why do you keep running from me?” Yukimaru demands. All of Jin’s attacks serve only as defense, and Yukimaru can see that. It frustrates him. Jin could continue in this way, exhaust them both, until the fight became more and more one-sided. Until the sun rose. And then, when Yukimaru was at last unable to attack or defend himself, Jin could cut him down.

Jin leaps back from a strike, and remains there. Yukimaru does the same. “You are determined to go through with this?” Jin asks. He knows the answer. But there is a part of him hoping he will be surprised.

There is nothing but resolve in Yukimaru’s eyes. “Even if you betray me, even if you turn your back on me,” he avows, “I will never let you get away from me!” And Jin knows, then, the truth of the matter. It’s not fame Yukimaru wants. Nor is it revenge. It’s not something Jin is able to give, even in death.

He lowers his arm, sword at his side. Yukimaru charges. Jin hitches his wrist.

A familiar weight on his shoulder. A familiar warmth. “I only wanted…one thing,” Yukimaru rasps. “To be you.”

Jin murmurs his name. An entreaty, an apology, a prayer.

He had been wrong, before. The forest isn’t quiet. The wind in the trees, the hum of insects and the faint sound of rushing water fill the air, although the river is slow here and they are a long way from the waterfall. How had he thought these mountains silent? They are alive with sound.

Even so the quiet scuff of Fuu’s slippers is audible as she approaches from wherever she was watching the fight. Jin turns to the noise. She is tying her hair up in its usual messy shimada, carefully sliding her hairpins through the knot. It’s not an inconsiderate or shallow action; rather, Jin thinks she is trying to be respectful, presenting herself formally in honor of the dead. Jin expects questions, but Fuu is silent as she comes to stand beside him. Perhaps she senses he is not ready to speak. Is it truly that the people in his life are so perceptive? Or is it that he is easy to read?

They stand there for a time.

Jin kneels and turns Yukimaru over onto his back. He straightens, clasps his hands in prayer, and Fuu does the same. For his benefit, maybe. More likely a proper upbringing.

“Who was he, Jin?” she asks. “Did you know him?”

So she had not heard their exchange. Jin is grateful for that, in some small measure. Yukimaru’s last words were not for others. But Fuu has taken the time to pray with him, she deserves to know who she’s praying for. “He was like a little brother to me,” Jin murmurs.

Fuu’s only answer is a small exhalation. Surprise, or sorrow, or even understanding, maybe. He can sense that she wants to ask more, but she doesn’t.

He opens his eyes. He will tell her someday. “That’s ancient history now,” is all he says.

Movement on the far bank catches his attention, and he pulls Fuu down with him to crouch behind the rocks. She squeaks in surprise, but shuts up immediately as voices and footsteps ring out across the river. Mastumae-han. They’ve found who they were looking for. Jin notices his hand is still on Fuu’s neck, his fingers splayed across her nape, his thumb pressed into the vulnerable space between her neck and jaw where her pulse beats fast against his skin. He withdraws his hand, but Fuu hardly seems to notice.

“Okuru…? Did they say Okuru just now?” she asks worriedly, and Jin affirms.

She takes off, ignoring Jin’s protest, and he has no choice but to follow. She runs blindly through the woods, looking as determined as he has ever seen her. It is his turn to ask who this man is to her.

“I have to help him! I owe him my life!” she explains, confirming Jin’s suspicions. She certainly has an affinity for falling in with criminals. At the beginning of their journey he would not have guessed from her behavior and manner of speaking that she was particularly reverent or attached to custom, but she still manages to surprise him. They are more alike than he thought. “You have a strong sense of duty, I see.”

With a poetry that Yukimaru would have appreciated, Fuu declares, “When duty goes out of style, the world will be nothing but darkness!”

…

The forest is quiet again. The burning man, gone over the waterfall like something out of a myth. The Matsumae officials, scattered or dead.

“I’d like to bury him,” Jin says, breaking the silence.

Fuu nods. “Okay. I’ll come too.”

Mugen, who can’t know what they’re talking about, follows without a single word. He seems subdued after tonight’s events.

Yukimaru is where they left him. They dig a burial mound in the gray light of dawn, and Jin offers Yukimaru’s sword. He and Fuu pray once more. Mugen stands silently beside them.

Then they are back where they started. Poised to head off in opposite directions. An impasse.

Fuu mutters something about the Ghost of Yoshitsune, seemingly just for something to say. “I swear, what a load of garbage,” she finishes. Jin waits for her to say something else, something about wanting to travel together again, but she doesn’t.

It’s Mugen who speaks instead. “So tell me. Why are you trying to find this sunflower samurai guy? Is it revenge?”

In contrast to Mugen’s borderline accusatory tone, Fuu’s is conciliatory. “That’s right. Revenge for my mom. Or something like that.” It’s not everything. But it’s something.

Then it falls to Jin. And there is no hesitation from him – he made up his mind hours ago, and did not know it until this moment. Before they buried Yukimaru, before they witnessed Okuru’s death, before he found Fuu. Before Yukimaru found him. There’s no need to search for a purpose. He already has one. “Whatever the reason, wars aren’t won on an empty stomach,” he says pragmatically. And with that, he starts down the path.

Mugen chimes in immediately, as if he was waiting for a cue. “You got that right.” He joins Jin, geta clacking familiarly across soil and stone. After a moment of incredulity, and Mugen’s “c’mon girly, move your ass”, Fuu falls into step with them.

They do have a way of falling back together.

Is there something significant about the myriad colors of the sunrise, splayed out across a wide open sky? Something meaningful in coming down from the mountains, walking together toward the light? Jin wouldn’t really know. But Yukimaru would appreciate the thought.

…

“Let’s stop in the next town,” Mugen yawns. “I’m beat.”

“We can’t stop yet, we’ve barely started!” Fuu tosses over her shoulder. “Jeez, you guys are so slow today!”

“You’re the only one who got any sleep,” Mugen grumbles.

Despite Jin’s fatigue, the walk hasn’t been unpleasant. The clear dawn gave way to a clear day. There are hardly any clouds, but a gentle breeze softens the direct sunlight. He tips his head back slightly to admire the blue of the sky.

“So you stuck with the brat after all,” Mugen says.

“Our paths happened to cross again,” Jin corrects.

“Something to do with that guy we buried?”

“You could say that.”

“Hmf.” There’s a short pause. “Y’know, I forgot to come back and kill you.”

“As did I,” Jin admits. “Until much later.”

“Too bad for you. I’m not gonna forget again.” But Mugen is smiling. More of a sneer, really, but coming from the former pirate it’s the same thing.

“Nor will I.” Jin allows his own lips to curve. And that’s all that needs to be said.

They trudge along, both captivated by the spring in Fuu’s step. She’s practically marching. The two of them are nearly dragging their feet, comrades in exhaustion.

“You think she has any idea where she’s going?”

“Absolutely not.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> During the credits/final song (which is lovely by the way) for Part 2, you see a shot of a burial mound with what looks like Yukimaru's sword sticking out of it. It makes sense to me that Jin would go back and bury him.


End file.
